Psalm 82

The psalm reading for this week is phenomenal.  It ties us back vividly to Judaism's heritage from the old Canaanite culture.  We are presented with a vivid picture of a heavenly assembly of the Canaanite Pantheon.  The chief god, our God, YHVH [El, Elkiniza, Amuru] declares that no other divine being controls human destiny.  In the near-eastern culture, it was taken for granted that there were many gods in charge of many different facets of life in our universe.  Now God calls an assembly of these lesser gods. So far ,anthropologists have identified 234 Canaanite deities, so this is a big meeting!  Some of the more prominent attendees would have been Baal (war), Dagon (weather), Moloch (fire), Yam (the sea), and Mot (death).  There would also have been a number of lady gods:  Atherit (YHVH's wife), Baalah (Baal's wife), and the war goddesses Anat and Astarte.

Interestingly, in Canaanite lore, YHVH and his wife Atherit [Asherah] reigned together.  She was represented in the holy bamot, shrines in high places, by poles.  However, Judaism, with its growing patriarchal tone, demoted Atherit.  We find in the Jewish Scriptures of cases concerning women who were found with images of the goddess, likely miniature sacred poles.  That was apparently a most difficult allegiance to break even in the man's world being forged by ancient Jews..

YHVH has called this convocation in order to charge all the lesser gods with injustice, with refusing to uphold the weak and disadvantaged and instead siding with the wicked.  His judgement is accompanied by earthquake (a popular theophany) and then he shows his power by stripping the other gods of their immortality.!  Now they will die like mortals, leaving YHVH alone as sovereign of the universe.  No doubt, the story is also aetiological, explaining how monolatry (Jewish worship of YHVH alone) was replaced by monotheism (Jewish assertion of the existence of only one deity, the YHVH, whom they worship.. 

The important take-away from this psalm is God's unwavering love and commitment for all of his children, especially the marginalized and poor, and his hostility towards evil people who propser by taking advantage of them.